The benchmark Sensex, on Friday (March 13), marked its closure after making a gain of 412.86 points at 8,756.61, which is its highest gain in the current calendar year. The
30-share index achieved this on the back of all-round buying action witnessed across stocks, strong global signals despite sustained capital outflows.

On the other hand, the broad based NSE Nifty grew by 101.80 points (3.89%) at 2,719.25 on Friday. In the week ended March 13, 2009, Sensex surged 430.79 points to
8,756.61. On the other hand, the broad based NSE Nifty climbed 99.1 points, or 3.78%, to 2,719.25 in the same period. Second line stocks also performed well.

BSE Midcap and Smallcap index gained 2.96% and 1.97% respectively. Amongst the sectors, BSE Realty was the major gainer, which gained 7.57% followed by Metal zoomed 6.26%, Bankex surged 5.85% and IT moved up 5.63%. Before this peak, the Sensex surged 492.28 points (5.37%) on December 10, 2008. Friday's rally was partly the outcome of optimistic statements by heads of Bank of America, Citi and JP Morgan on their profitableness that has activated a rally in worldwide markets over the last few days.

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) turned buyers after uniform selling for more than a month. As per the provisional figures available from the stock market, FIIs purchased shares worth Rs 299.24 crore and domestic funds invested Rs 392.69 crore on Friday. Samir Arora, fund manager of Singapore-based Helios Capital, said, "Internationally, the equity markets had priced bank stocks by taking into consideration that many of them were moving towards bankruptcy.

However, when top banks like Citibank and Bank of America declared that they are back in profits in the last two months, it has provided great relief to the financial sector." Gul Tekchandani, investment consultant, said: "Our oversold markets were waiting for a trigger, which was provided by the foreign developments."

According to him, though India has not seen bailouts and failure of institutions unlike the US, the domestic markets have suffered largely from poor sentiment. The major movers of the day were DLF (11.47%), Tata Motors (10.72%), Reliance Capital (9.31%), Tata Power Company (9.18%), ICICI Bank (8.60%), and Hindalco Industries (7.99%). On the other hand, NTPC (2.04%), and Sun Pharmaceutical Industries (0.36%) were the top losers in the Sensex pack.

Business volumes improved to Rs 3,230.11 crore as against Rs 2,726.77 crore on Thursday. But, trading volumes remained low at 266.1 million shares. ICICI Bank remained the top-traded share with the highest turnover of Rs 253.55 crore, followed by Akruti (Rs 192.74 crore), RIL (Rs 180.72 crore), Educomp Sol (Rs 168.86 crore) and Bharti Airtel (Rs 122.28 crore).